Swirling Seas
I should have spotted the signs. Looking back, they were plain as day. The dream was simple. I’m on a small boat in a storm; rough seas with grey swirling water and driving rain is knocking me off my feet. The boat, a tiny vessel in an unending ocean, is being tossed around, the faceless crew and I hold on for dear life.
Then it comes into view, a horrifying rogue wave rises on the horizon, powering towards us, growing larger and larger. Within moments, it’s upon us, towering before the bow of the boat, like a wall of swirling fury. There’s nothing we can do, but wait for it to crest, and submerge us.
As I pondered the dream on waking, I knew it was significant, even thinking about it now, it’s a potent image in my mind. Unlike the majority of dreams, which fade into the ether like passing clouds, instead of taking it as the omen it so obviously was, I got on with my day, filing the nautical hellscape away in my mind. I spent the next few days in good spirits; I reconnected with an old school friend, bringing each other up to speed on the last 25 years, while we drank great beer and reminiscenced. I spent time in nature; walking the trails at Gibside, listening to Goldcrests sing in the hazy Spring sunshine. It was serene.
However, on return home, a deep exhaustion washed over me. Even napping and food didn’t help. As I tossed and turned in bed I awoke, or I thought I did. Our bedroom seemed larger, more detailed. It was disconcerting. Then I saw it; a spectral figure slowly gliding down our hallway. It silently entered out bedroom, two jewel like eyes bore into mine. Terror struck me. I tried to move but couldn’t. It came closer walking around the bed towards me, never once looking away. I tried to muster the ability to shout, to wake Emma, to get her out of the room.
Closer and closer it came until it stood directly over me. Staring down, inspecting its prey. I’m struggling to think of a time when I was more frightened. I tried, one final time to scream as the being began to press down on my chest, when Emma shook me awake. The room snapped into a dimmer, lower resolution. The being was gone. Apparently I was making unintelligible noises that had woken her up, she’d known something was very wrong.
I’m well aware of sleep paralysis, sometimes known as ‘Old Hag Syndrome’, when your brain awakens, but your body remains asleep. The phenomenon is one in which the sleeper feels the presence of a supernatural, malevolent being which immobilises the person as if sitting on their chest or the foot of their bed. I originally came across this while reading the Fortean Times as a weird child. I thought it sounded amazing. Young Andrew, you were an idiot.
Pulling myself together from this terrible night’s sleep I drove to work feeling incredibly low. Thoughts of Emma’s illness, her forthcoming surgery, of weekly enforced office time swirled in my mind like the sea in my dream. Everything suddenly felt hopeless as I sobbed my way along the A69. The darkness contrasted starkly against the light of the weekend; my cyclothymic brain fluctuating from manic happiness to crushing depression.
Cyclothymia is a mental disorder that causes extreme shifts in mood, energy and ability to think clearly. People with Cyclothymia experience rapid mood swings between hypomania and depression. While the exact cause of Cyclothymia is unknown. It is widely believed to be the result of chemical imbalances in the brain and seems to run in families. It is also thought to be triggered by stressful circumstances or situations.
Suffering from Cyclothymia can be a uniquely wild ride. During manic phases you can feel full of boundless energy, highly ambitious plans, and endless ideas. It’s like a drug come up, with a euphoric plateau you never reach.
It can be incredibly exhilarating if you’re able to realise what’s happening. Usually however, I’m too busy building a website, or setting up a business to take any notice. This is where my Working Men’s Club project emerged from; a manic evening of conquering the then nascent Midjourney, to create an unending series of bairns smoking tabs and sculling pints.
Thanks to Cyclothymia, you also make some spectacularly bad decisions. Such as spending a terrifying amount of money on things you absolutely can’t afford. You don’t sleep well, don’t want to eat, all while being highly animated one moment, and full of rage the next.
Mania has been a mainstay in my life, however not until my diagnosis, could I give these fun packed episodes a name, or even try to explain my actions.Odd behaviour had been with me from childhood; from obsessive collecting of bottles, magazines, posters, and any other old shit I could lay my hands on, hours would be spent compulsively cleaning my bedroom or I’d spend entire sleepless nights just watching the same movie on repeat. It was simply, as my family and friends will attest, just who I was. At no point was my behaviour ever challenged, which goes to show how self absorbed the eighties were.
As I got into my early twenties financial recklessness became a big thing. I amassed over £20K in credit card debt before leaving university and earning just £6 an hour, then walked out of a six-year job on whim at the age of 23, despite it being the only thing paying my rent and keeping me afloat.
Safe to say, manic behaviour is somewhat of a mainstay in my life.It wasn’t all bad, mania allowed me to talk myself into TV writing roles, filming commercially released BTS music videos, receiving a cease-and-desist notice from Police Academy star Steve Guttenburg about the ridiculously offensive comic book I co-wrote, blagging jobs in the brewing trade, and even getting to fly to Los Angeles to make a documentary about Cold Steel Knives president Lynn C. Thompson.
Did I parlay said documentary into further work in the industry? Absolutely not, instead, I sold all of my camera equipment, deleted all my editing software and moved on to the next thing.
With my highs, however, came the crushing lows. As each phase of mania peaked with whatever ridiculous thing I’d ended up doing / buying / imbibing / agreeing to, came the race to the bottom.
The depressive yin to my elevated yang succeeded in sucking the joy from everyday life and filling me with dark thoughts, extreme lethargy, and crippling anxiety that make each day feel like a hopeless struggle. A breakdown of a relationship in 2008 triggered my worst phase; a spiral into a deep depression and borderline alcoholism that lasted several months. I was unable to work, isolated myself from family and friends and entered a pattern of, not to put too kind a point on it, risky behaviour and a freesion of suicidal ideation.
It was a dark, self-destructive time but one which, finally, saw me reach out to a professional for help. My then employer offered a counselling service I was able to access. One late night teary and drunken call to their 24-hour helpline saw me placed with a counsellor in Newcastle whom I visited for four months, while my GP trialled me on various anti-depressant medication.My highs and lows continued to fluctuate over the years but thankfully never to the debilitating extent they had in the past. With a strict focus diet, exercise, and mindfulness meditation I managed to, for the most part, self-regulate.
Then came the ol’ Panny-D. The loss of order and routine was the fan to my mental health’s flame. My drinking increased, I started smoking again after years of hiatus, all while exercise and self-care went quickly out of the window. Naturally, my patterns of manic behaviour increased dramatically.
From buying countless vintage digital cameras, an expensive guitar despite having not played in the best part of two decades, to starting a T-shirt side hustle. The latter did raise a solid amount of money for Hospitality Action to be fair, I’d show you the website had I not deleted it on a whim like I so often do.
All my grandiose planning and plotting was quickly followed with a depressive cliff edge drop sensationally soon after. This time was slightly different; I’d started to hallucinate. I’d catch glimpses of people in my house in my peripheral vision.
Whether cooking a meal, watching TV or working from home, I would often be on the hunt for these invisible visitors in and around my home. It was unsettling to say the least. My cycles of mania and depression began to heighten in both strength and duration, culminating in me taking a calamitously drunken fall down a flight of concrete stairs after a particularly exuberant night.
I somehow managed to walk four miles home with ripped jeans and huge, bleeding cuts on my legs. Incredibly, just one year later, I slipped off a curb outside my house and shattered my hip in three places, finding out in hospital I had osteopenia. I can only guess that my sensationally drunk state somehow saved me from destroying every bone in my body. Bizarre.
This, however, was the wakeup call that I wasn’t going to get better under my own steam. I needed to get professional help. Again.
I reached out not just to my GP, but also to my employers, to access our counselling services. These sessions were a genuine lifeline. Up until this point, I’d felt adrift, unable to tackle the thoughts and feelings I was experiencing. Counselling was a genuine tonic; allowing me to work through my current feelings and patterns of behaviour while being given the opportunity to look back over similar occurrences and triggers in my past.
My sessions gave me the insight to keep myself within an acceptable window of tolerance. Counselling has also guided my treatment plan; helping me provide much needed information to the mental health team who were able to quickly find me the right specialist to work with.
It is difficult to put into words the benefits that come with talking therapy. Gone are the difficulties in speaking to loved ones or any potential embarrassment about opening up to friends or colleagues; it’s completely impartial. Talking about your issues is the first step in making sense of them.
In the maelstrom of awfulness affecting Emma at the moment, it’s become obvious that I’ve been in a manic phase for around eight months. Looking after Emma was and is my sole focus. However, having returned to the world of work after a long period of absence, my brain is seemingly struggling to balance the nine to five work tasks with the forthcoming unknowns of Emma’s surgery.
Several months of counselling last year have kept the rapid cycling to an absolute minimum as Em’s treatment was all consuming, but now I’m thinking it is time to look into mood stabilising medication, and getting an ADHD assessment I’ve been putting off since forever.
The last thing Emma needs is a carer who is suddenly obsessed with playing the xylophone or something equally ridiculous. Now just the small matter of paying for it. I’m sure I’ll have three hundred ideas on how to do just that on my next trip on the mental rollercoaster.